Keeping Up With the Bonds: Agent Solid Snake Slithers On

March 30, 2004

As Donald Kaufman parrots in Adaptation, Fellini was the last moviemaker to invent a film genre. (The mockumentary, that is— Christopher Guest just added the hilarious gay stereotypes. No, wait . . . see Satyricon.) In hopelessly self-reflexive games of the future, Hideo Kojima will be snarkily remembered as creator of the sneak-and-snipe, the industry’s smartest exploitation of console technology. The Twin Snakes, which consolidates and improves Kojima’s Metal Gear Solid for PS1, and its sequel, Sons of Liberty, slithers into the now exceptionally competitive field of stealth titles. At this point, the best Konami can do is keep up with the Bonds and Clancys. No amount of polish will make a Pathfinder into a Hummer; think of this turn-of-the-millennium port as the first SUV on the block, retrofitted with black lights and 20-inch rims.

The flashy, all-new cutscenes actually distract from the game’s innovation: the emphasis on artificial intelligence over player progress. As secret operative Solid Snake, you are hunted by terrorists more often than you hunt them. Driven by a tweaked engine that now allows you to hang off ledges and switch from third- to first-person (while hijacked-nuke-facility guards track the bodies you leave behind and call for backup), and sustained by a twisting storyline, a cast of untrustworthy characters, and a boss who can download your memories, The Twin Snakes explores the outer reaches of negative space, where everyone can hear you whisper.

007: EVERYTHING OR NOTHING

(EA Games—GameCube, PS2, Xbox) 8

The cinema’s about as gripping as any recent Bond, which is to say not at all. But the seamless action—now presented in third person—is spit-shined and ever shifting. You’ll pass through Egypt, Peru, New Orleans, and Moscow, crouching, sniping, rappelling, remote-controlling cars and bombs, and driving weaponized motorcycles and Porsche SUVs. And you have “Bond Sense.” And you can become invisible. But that’s it.

FATAL FRAME 2: CRIMSON BUTTERFLY

(Tecmo—PS2) 7

The delicate underage twins who drift through this high-minded survival update imperil themselves all too pornographically but pop flashbulbs instead of the typical FPS plasma phallus. As Mio, you follow Mayu into a post-massacre phantasmagoria—a black, fast-cut creepfest equal to most Hollywood horror—capturing lost souls on your camera obscura while picking up clues like newspaper clippings. There are no bosses to pelt, and the puzzles and plot kinks keep you looking over your shoulder rather than shooting from the hip.

FINAL FANTASY: CRYSTAL CHRONICLES

(Nintendo—GameCube) 8

This Final Fantasy experiment, dreamed up by market-hungry Nintendo, introduces a multiplayer mode requiring Game Boys. Loyalists will be disappointed if they attempt this threadbare adventure alone. But up to four chums, substituting GBs for controllers, will cooperate and compete—and be forced to communicate—in a way that redefines the term role-play. Fulfill individual bonus objectives to progress ahead of your partners—those bastards!

MAXIMO VS ARMY OF ZIN

(Capcom—PS2) 8

Really just an improvement on 2002’s overly difficult Ghosts to Glory, Army of Zin boasts action as crisp and effervescent as Crystal Pepsi. Only boyish gladiator Maximo, armor-clad and bearing sword, shield, and hammer, can save the kingdom from blade-armed ghosts in machines. For geeks who warp to Middle-earth via IMAX, such retrofuturist technophobia charges fantasy’s frisson. It’s Bronze Age romanticism, reforged in silicon.

METROID: ZERO MISSION

(Nintendo—GameBoy Advance) 8

Twenty years ago, fans of Metroid for NES suited up on Planet Zebes, blasted Skeeters, chipped away at Ridley and Kraid, and finally outsmarted Mother Brain. Today, America’s 20 million GBA owners can suit up on Planet Zebes, blast Skeeters, chip away at Ridley and Kraid, and finally outsmart Mother Brain—on the subway! (I once saw a hobo do this without a GameBoy.)

MVP BASEBALL 2004

(EA Sports—PS2, Xbox) 9

This series turnaround is stacked with the entire MLBPA and minor league, has a hyper-realistic bead on baseball’s fundamental mechanics, and encourages you to sim your way through a season as manager. By porting the game’s history and allowing you to lead your club many years into the future, the disc makes a poetic argument for declaring the de facto American sport—console gaming—our official pastime.

MX UNLEASHED

(THQ—PS2, Xbox) 8

There’s a thousand and one ways to make an ass of yourself in what is the funnest race-trick-crash blowout since last holiday season’s SSX 3. The game thrills like few other white-trash sports titles, mostly because you can launch off jumps into the propellers of passing helicopters. I’d like to see Al Qaeda do that with a donkey.

The world’s best hack-and-slash epic: Basic combos multiply into wall-run back flips and blood-spurt beheadings, the smoothest acrobatics and most graceful gore this side of the Pacific. Counter meatier and meatier varieties of enemies with swords, nunchakus and bow-and-arrow, all while grabbing technique-teaching scrolls and running across walls and—WWJD?—on water. You just won’t be able to turn it into wine.

THE SUFFERING

(Midway—PS2, Xbox) 7

As Torque—a musclehead jailed for, but not necessarily guilty of, killing his wife and kids—you mostly splatter classical Stan Winston monsters. If you’re in it for the copious blood (why else would you be?) there’s no reason not to shotgun monsters and innocent prisoners, confirming your guilt at game’s end. Why not encourage the player to prove their innocence?